Somehow it has become a "right to entitlement". A small segment of people believe that the four dollars they give to the nice volunteer at the door gives them the right to vent their frustrations, or even pass on their vast, untapped basketball knowledge (if they know so much why are they sitting in the stands?) to the players, coaches and especially the guys and gals wearing the striped shirts.

Maybe I haven't been to enough games to get an appropriate sample size, but for some reason this year I've seen some really bad behavior. So much so that a couple of fans from a certain team actually apologized to me for the way some of their fellow rooters had been acting. I will say that the game in question was poorly officiated, but their behavior was still over the top, becoming vile and very, very personal. I won't reveal the school in question, but it was a poor representation of the school and in a way was embarrassing to me because the school is affiliated with the same religious faith to which I belong.

Usually in large gyms that are full of people, it all just kind of blends in with the rest of the sound, but I bring this up because recently I was at a game where there were about 50 people watching, so every little thing was amplified. I had to listen to it all game long as a small group of parents yelled at kids for doing the wrong thing on the floor and jumped on the officials when they weren't getting calls. One parent was all over an official for not making a charge call with about two minutes to go in the game -- and his team was up by 25 points! The call wasn't going to happen for two reasons: 1) it was a borderline call that could have gone either way so the ref let it go and 2) we were long into garbage time and I think everyone wanted to just keep the clock running and get the game over with.

The kids will probably never say it, but I know they hate it when people act that way because I know I did when I was a kid. All I wanted to do was put the other things going on in my life aside for a while and have fun playing a game. My parents were pretty cool about it, but I could hear other fans trying to get their say, and it really took away from the game. And I saw that it really embarrassed my friends, too.

It's a game, and, to steal a catchphrase from the Varsity Dad online blog: your kid ain't LeBron. Have fun, support and encourage the team, but most of all show a little class. If you would find it inappropriate to see someone act like that and treat people like that at work or in a grocery store, why is it OK to do it at a basketball game? Just because you paid to get in?